Okaloosa County Probate Court: Where to File and What to File

Where the Okaloosa County Probate Court Actually Sits

Okaloosa County probate is heard in the First Judicial Circuit, and the Probate Division sits at the Okaloosa County Courthouse Annex Extension at 1940 Lewis Turner Boulevard in Fort Walton Beach, where the probate judge keeps chambers in Suite 3-439. Crestview is the county seat, and the Okaloosa County Clerk of Court and Comptroller keeps its main office there at the Okaloosa County Courthouse, 101 East James Lee Boulevard, with a second counter at the Fort Walton Beach annex.

One division carries probate and guardianship for the whole county, north end and south end alike, out of that one annex courtroom. Mental health went the other way in October 2025, when every Baker Act and Marchman Act case moved to a county court division, so the judge who hears a parent’s estate is not the judge who hears a Baker Act petition about the same parent. The Clerk keeps the same counter hours at both buildings, Monday to Friday from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., inside buildings that open at 8:00 a.m. and close at 5:00 p.m.

The probate counter is at the Okaloosa County Courthouse, 101 East James Lee Boulevard, Suite 108, Crestview, FL 32536, with a second counter at the Courthouse Annex Extension, 1940 Lewis Turner Boulevard, Fort Walton Beach, FL 32547, Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., inside buildings open from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., 850-689-5000 in Crestview and 850-651-7200 in Fort Walton Beach. The Clerk lists both offices and does not say which counter takes a probate filing by hand, while the probate judge and the Probate Division sit at the Fort Walton Beach annex, so call before you drive. Courier deliveries for Crestview go to 501 North Main Street rather than to the courthouse. No room number, no will-deposit procedure and no deposit fee are published. The forms the Clerk does post are the disposition of personal property packet, both caveat forms, the email consent form, a statement of claim, a situs designation, a change of mailing address, and a request to be excused from email designation.

• The clerk’s probate page for Okaloosa County
• First Judicial Circuit judges directory
• Administrative orders of the First Judicial Circuit
• Local probate forms and checklists

One thing worth settling before you go any further. The case belongs in the county where the person was domiciled when they died, and Florida law fixes that rather than letting anyone choose it. If your mother lived in Okaloosa County, her estate is a Okaloosa County case, even if you live in another state and even if a different courthouse would be more convenient for everyone involved. It is the county that decides, not the town, so estates from Destin, Fort Walton Beach, Crestview, Niceville, Mary Esther, and Shalimar are all Okaloosa County cases filed with the same clerk. Which division or section then hears the case is a separate question, and the next section answers it.

Parking and Coffee on the Way to the Courthouse

Parking at the Fort Walton Beach annex is free, in front of the building and on both sides, with accessible parking on all three sides. The Crestview courthouse record says the same. Neither the circuit nor the Clerk posts a garage or a price, because neither building uses one. The court keeps its own parking and directions page.

Which Judges Hear Probate Cases in Okaloosa County?

Probate cases in Okaloosa County are heard by the judges the chief judge assigns to the division, and the circuit publishes who they are. Knowing who has the division tells you whose procedures apply to your hearing, and how long a judge has had it tells you how settled those procedures are.

• John Brown, Division 004 at the Okaloosa County Courthouse Annex Extension in Fort Walton Beach, holding probate and guardianship for the whole county, north and south, alongside part of the family law docket and the injunction docket, assigned April 1, 2026 under the current directive, and July 17, 2025 on the earliest published directive that carries the same assignment (OCAD 2026-01, with OCAD 2025-05 behind the 2025 date).

The circuit’s judicial directory is the source, read on September 16, 2026. Assignments rotate, usually at the start of a calendar year, so check it before a hearing.

How Busy the Okaloosa County Probate Court Is

The state court system counts every petition filed in the circuit probate division, and the FY 2024-25 figures for Okaloosa County are 665 probate filings, 98 guardianship filings and 2 trust filings, plus 589 Baker Act and Marchman Act cases that the same division carries. The division closed 561 probate cases in the same year. Spread across one judge, that is about 665 new probate cases per judge a year, which is the number behind how long an uncontested order takes to get signed.

Statewide the probate column was 73,282 filings against 141,166 for the whole division in FY 2024-25, so more than a third of what a Florida probate judge signs has nothing to do with an estate. The figures come from the Office of the State Courts Administrator's Statistical Reference Guide, chapter 6, and the next fiscal year's edition usually appears the following autumn.

How a Case Gets Filed in Okaloosa County Today

Florida runs one statewide electronic filing system, the Florida Courts E-Filing Portal, and every circuit court in the state receives filings through it. Attorneys have no choice about it. The rule says attorneys must file through the portal, and no other method is permitted except in the narrow situations the rule itself lists.

A self-represented person is in a different position, and this is the part almost nobody is told. You may elect to register for the portal and file electronically, or you may hand or mail paper to the clerk, who converts it to electronic format for the official court file. Both routes are proper and both land in the same queue. One caution rides along with the choice. Once you elect to file electronically, you cannot go back to paper without the court’s permission.

Registering costs nothing and filing itself costs nothing. What you pay is the statutory filing fee for the case, plus a payment convenience fee that depends on whether you pay by card or by electronic check.

The practical consequence is that a Okaloosa County estate does not require anyone to be in Florida. An out-of-state family can open, run, and close a case from a kitchen table in another state, because the filings, the notices, and the proposed orders all move electronically. The exceptions are physical documents, and there are only a few of them.

Okaloosa assigns by subject rather than by geography. Division 004 carries probate and guardianship for the whole county, north and south, so there is no ZIP code test, no rotation and no draw among divisions. Where the case is heard is settled with it, because the probate judge sits at the Fort Walton Beach annex even though the county seat and the Clerk’s main office are in Crestview at the north end of the county. Mental health is the one thing that moved. Since October 29, 2025 every Baker Act and Marchman Act case belongs to a county court division, with the hearings going to the general magistrate.

Are Okaloosa County Probate Hearings Remote?

Probate hearings in Okaloosa County can be held remotely on Zoom, and the division decides which matters must be in person. No standing room is published here. The meeting ID varies with the hearing type and comes from the judicial assistant, and the notice of hearing has to state whether the hearing is at the courthouse or on Zoom. The judge’s page sets the conditions, namely courtroom dress and conduct, the full name as the username, a quiet private location, no appearing while driving, camera on with the microphone muted until instructed, and the party calling a remote witness answers for that witness’s camera, microphone and connection. Case management conferences, which are required for any trial or hearing of four hours or more, are held twice a month on Zoom. Whether a routine probate hearing is remote by default or by request is not published, so ask when you schedule.

The division’s remote hearing instructions carry the current links and the dress and conduct rules, which judges enforce on camera exactly as they do in the room.

Where the Original Will Goes

Here is the rule that catches almost everyone, and it is stricter than families expect. Whoever is holding the original will has to deposit it with the clerk of the court that has venue over the estate, within 10 days of receiving information that the person has died. Read that trigger carefully. The clock does not start at the death, it starts when the custodian learns of the death, and the duty belongs to that custodian personally. It does not wait for a lawyer, it does not wait for the family to agree on anything, and it applies whether or not anybody intends to open a probate case. When the will goes in, the clerk also wants the date of death or the last four digits of the deceased person’s Social Security number.

The original itself travels on paper. Whatever a county does about an electronic copy, the physical document has to reach the clerk, and how it gets there is settled county by county rather than statewide. Florida law gives the custodian ten days from learning of the death to deposit the original with the Clerk. Okaloosa publishes no deposit procedure, no room number and no deposit fee, and the Clerk’s probate page lists both offices without saying which counter takes an original by hand, so call before you drive. Crestview answers at 850-689-5000 and the Fort Walton Beach annex at 850-651-7200. One address trap sits in the same place. Courier deliveries for the Crestview office go to 501 North Main Street rather than to the courthouse on James Lee Boulevard.

Three things families routinely get wrong here are worth naming. Depositing the will is not probating it, so handing the original to the clerk does not open an estate, does not appoint anyone, and does not make you responsible for the debts. It is a filing, not a job. A copy is not a substitute either, because a court can admit a lost or destroyed will but proving one is a separate proceeding with a heavier burden, which is a poor trade for a document that could have been walked to a counter. And sitting on a will is a genuinely bad idea. A custodian can be compelled to produce it, and where the court finds there was no just or reasonable cause for holding it back, Florida awards costs, damages, and a reasonable attorney fee against that person personally.

Two small mercies. If the original goes in attached to the petition, Florida treats it as deposited, so it is not a second errand. And once the clerk has it, the original is kept in its original form for at least 20 years whether or not it is ever admitted to probate. Scanning a will does not replace it.

Which Forms You Actually Need

The honest answer surprises people, so here it is plainly. Florida has an official statewide form set for family law, approved by the Supreme Court and free for anyone to use. It has never built the same thing for probate. The state’s own self-help service says as much, telling visitors that it does not provide any forms related to the probate process and to ask a lawyer which form is needed.

So when you search for the Okaloosa County probate forms, you are looking for something that does not exist as one official packet, which is why the results are a scatter of clerk pages, circuit pages, and companies selling you a template. What actually controls comes from three layers, and you need all three.

• The Florida Probate Rules, which prescribe contents rather than forms. The rule on the petition for administration lists eleven things the petition must state, from the decedent’s domicile to whether the proposed personal representative has been convicted of a felony. A document that satisfies the rule is legally sufficient even if it looks nothing like anyone’s template. The rules do carry a small set of forms of their own, but they are almost entirely guardianship forms, and the rules say outright that those forms are not intended to be part of the rules and are provided for convenience only. The one decedent-estate form actually written into the probate rules is the oath of the personal representative.
• The practitioner form set. Most Florida probate documents you will ever see are built from a numbered probate form set published by a private nonprofit and sold commercially. Lawyers treat it as the standard. It is not court-approved, and nothing obliges a court to accept it.
• The local layer, which is the one that rejects you. Okaloosa is a checklist county with a routing rule and a calendar behind it. Ten checklists are posted as fillable PDFs, covering the opening of a formal administration, summary administration, closing a formal administration, homestead, exempt property, interim fees, guardianship fees, mental health guardianship, guardian advocacy, and plenary or limited guardianship, and each one is e-filed with its proposed order. Where it goes decides whether anyone reads it. Most of them are filed to a portal destination named OKALOOSA, PROBATE-GUARDIANSHIP ONLY, while three go through the portal straight to the judge, namely the second mental health guardianship checklist, the petition for interim fees and expenses, and guardianship fees. A submission sent to the wrong destination draws an email from the judicial assistant with a link to the instructions, which costs days rather than the filing. Proposed orders are named in a set format, the case number, then the last name, then the title of the order, with the word EMERGENCY inserted after the case number when it applies. An order coming out of a hearing goes through the portal to the judge with a cover letter stating the date the hearing was held, submitted by the prevailing attorney within seven calendar days, and disputed language goes to the judicial assistant as a Word redline. Hearings are set only by email to the judicial assistant with opposing counsel and self-represented parties on the thread, giving the case number, the party names, the motions with their docket numbers and the time needed, and the notice of hearing is filed and served immediately, stating whether the hearing is at the courthouse or on Zoom and carrying the accessibility notice the rules require. Anything the judge is meant to read before a hearing is e-filed at least three business days ahead, and exhibits for an evidentiary hearing go to the Clerk on the same three business day schedule. Probate and guardianship questions go to the division’s case manager rather than to the judicial assistant. Then there is the clock. A county directive still in force sets presumptive deadlines running from the issuance of the letters, with the inventory in 60 days, the death certificate in 90 days, a federal estate tax notice at 12 months where a return is required, and the petition for discharge in 12 months, or 24 where the estate is contested or a federal return is due. A motion to extend has to be filed before the deadline passes, and missing one without having moved first draws an order to show cause on contempt.

So start at the bottom of that list rather than the top. The circuit and the clerk publish what they want on their own forms and checklists page, and half an hour there before you draft anything is the cheapest half hour in the case.

The Administrative Orders That Govern Probate in Okaloosa County

Each circuit adds its own layer on top of the Florida Probate Rules through administrative orders signed by the chief judge and the procedures each division publishes, and that layer is where a petition gets rejected. These are the orders that govern probate practice in Okaloosa County as of September 16, 2026.

• OCAD 2026-01, Circuit and County Court Division Assignments for Okaloosa County (signed February 27, 2026, effective April 1, 2026). Places probate and guardianship for the whole county in Division 004 at the Fort Walton Beach annex and mental health in a county court division. The directive vacates ten earlier ones, which is why the county’s published index of directives no longer matches practice.
• OCAD 2009-06, Time Requirements (December 21, 2009, and still unvacated on the county index). Sets presumptive deadlines from the issuance of the letters, with the inventory in 60 days, the death certificate in 90 days, a federal estate tax notice at 12 months where a return is required, and the petition for discharge in 12 months, or 24 where the estate is contested or a federal return is due. A motion to extend has to be filed before the deadline, and missing one draws an order to show cause on contempt. The clerk serves the directive on every attorney of record and personal representative.
• OCAD 2025-06, Reassignment of Mental Health Cases in Okaloosa County (signed and effective October 29, 2025). Moves every open and future Baker Act and Marchman Act case to a county court division, so a family running an estate and a commitment matter at the same time is in front of two different judges.
• OCAD 2026-04, Procedure Regarding E-Delivery and E-Service of Filings in Okaloosa County (signed and effective May 19, 2026). Defines how the clerk delivers notification and emergency matters to the assigned judge, with an emergency email carrying the subject line EMERGENCY MATTER, the case number, the style and the judge, and a same business day disposition. Probate matters appear on neither enumerated list.
• OCAD 2016-04, Submission and Distribution Requirements for Orders in Civil Proceedings (April 26, 2016, never vacated). Sends proposed orders to the division by email in Word with the subject line PROPOSED ORDER. The circuit’s current probate pages and the judge’s own page route probate orders through the portal instead, so follow the portal and treat this order as history. The court posts it as a scanned image.
• OCAD 2017-02, Time Requirements in Guardianship Cases (April 2017). Puts the annual guardianship report on the first day of the fourth month after the anniversary month, with a month by month table in the directive itself.

The division also publishes its own procedures, and the points a filer most needs are these.

• Ten fillable checklists cover the opening of a formal administration, summary administration, closing, homestead, exempt property, interim fees, guardianship fees, mental health guardianship, guardian advocacy, and plenary or limited guardianship, and each is e-filed with its proposed order to the portal destination named OKALOOSA, PROBATE-GUARDIANSHIP ONLY.
• Three of the ten go through the portal to the judge instead, namely the second mental health guardianship checklist, the petition for interim fees and expenses, and guardianship fees. A submission sent to the wrong destination draws an email from the judicial assistant with a link to the instructions.
• Proposed orders are named case number, then last name, then title of the order, with EMERGENCY after the case number when it applies. An order out of a hearing goes to the judge with a cover letter stating the hearing date, submitted by the prevailing attorney within seven calendar days, and disputed language goes to the judicial assistant as a Word redline.
• Hearings are set only by email to kaitlyn.dalton@flcourts1.gov with opposing counsel and self-represented parties on the thread, giving the case number, the party names, the motions with docket numbers and the time needed. The notice of hearing is filed and served immediately and states the location, courthouse or Zoom, with the accessibility notice the rules require.
• Anything the judge is to read before a hearing is e-filed at least three business days ahead, and exhibits for an evidentiary hearing go to the Clerk on the same schedule. Probate and guardianship questions go to the case manager, thomas.golden@flcourts1.gov, rather than to the judicial assistant.
• The circuit’s own probate page still names a different judge for three of the carved out checklists, which has been stale since at least July 2025. The directives settle it, and the newer instructions page agrees with them.

The full procedures are on the court’s site, and they change more often than the statutes do.

The Checklist for Opening an Estate in Okaloosa County

This is the sequence for a formal administration, which is the full version. A smaller estate skips most of it, and the section after this one covers that. Each step below happens in this order for a reason, because the later ones depend on the earlier ones being done.

1. Order certified death certificates. The funeral home usually orders them and will ask how many you want. Ask for more than feels sensible, often five to ten, because the court, each bank, each insurer, and the property records all want their own certified copy, and reordering later is slow.
2. Find the original will and deposit it with the clerk. The 10-day clock runs from when the custodian learns of the death, not from when anyone files anything, and it is the one deadline that can already be running while the family is still planning a funeral. Where the original goes in Okaloosa County is above, and it is never just a matter of uploading it.
3. Decide which kind of administration the estate needs. Formal administration is the default. Summary administration and disposition without administration are lighter and cheaper, and they are worth ruling out before you file anything, because you cannot un-file a formal case cheaply.
4. Confirm the county. Venue follows the decedent’s domicile at death, or for someone who lived out of state, a county where they owned property. This is one of the few things in probate that is genuinely hard to fix later.
5. Prepare and e-file the petition for administration, with the local extras. The petition is verified, meaning signed under penalty of perjury, and it has to name every interested person, which is the line that most often comes back to bite an estate later. File it with whatever Okaloosa County adds on top, because that is what a rejection is usually about. The filing fee is $400.
6. File the oath, the address designation, and the designation of resident agent. All three are due before letters issue. The oath is a sworn promise to faithfully administer the estate, and the appointment rests on it. The address designation puts the representative’s street and mailing address on the record. The resident agent designation, signed by the agent accepting the job, is required unless the representative is a corporate fiduciary with a Florida office or a Florida Bar member who lives and keeps an office in Florida, which in practice means nearly every family representative files one and the attorney usually is the agent. These can be folded into the petition or the oath rather than filed separately.
7. Get the order and the letters of administration. Once the petition is in and the will is admitted, the court appoints the representative, sets or waives bond, and confirms the oath and resident agent papers are on file. Letters of administration then issue, and the letters are the thing that carries weight in the outside world. Order roughly ten certified copies at once, because banks, brokerages, and title companies each keep one and many will not accept letters more than 60 to 90 days old.
8. Get an estate tax identification number and open the estate account. This comes right after the letters and before anything else useful can happen, because no bank will open an account for the estate without both.
9. Serve the notice of administration. Florida says promptly rather than naming a day count. It goes to the surviving spouse, the beneficiaries, anyone who may be entitled to exempt property, and the trustee and qualified beneficiaries of certain trusts. Service starts a 3-month clock for the person served to challenge the validity of the will, the venue, or the court’s jurisdiction, and after that those objections are barred. That deadline is close to unextendable, because Florida allows an extension only for estoppel based on a misstatement by the personal representative about the deadline itself, and expressly not for failure to disclose information or for other misconduct. The clock also runs only against people who were actually served, so leaving someone off the list does not save time, it leaves the case open. The same notice starts a 4-month window to claim exempt property and a 6-month window for a surviving spouse to elect against the estate.
10. Publish the notice to creditors, serve the ones you know about, and document the search. The notice runs in a newspaper in the county once a week for two consecutive weeks. An unknown creditor then has 3 months from the first publication, and a creditor who had to be served gets the later of that or 30 days from service. The representative has to make a diligent search for reasonably ascertainable creditors, though Florida does not demand an impracticable one, and a verified statement about that search goes in within 4 months of the first publication, with proof of publication filed within 45 days. One item gets missed constantly. If the person who died was 55 or older, a copy of the notice and a death certificate go to Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration within 3 months of the first publication. And a reasonably ascertainable creditor who was never served keeps a claim for up to two years from the death.
11. File the inventory within 60 days of the letters, then close the estate. The inventory lists each asset at its date-of-death value and is served on the residuary beneficiaries and the surviving spouse. After the creditor period runs and the claims are resolved, the estate distributes and the representative files a final accounting and a petition for discharge. Florida puts a real deadline on that too, generally within 12 months after the letters issued for an estate that files no federal estate tax return. A straightforward case runs 6 to 12 months from letters to discharge, and the creditor window is what sets the floor.

What It Costs to File in Okaloosa County

These are the charges the clerk posts, not anyone’s legal fee.

Posted August 2026. Fee schedules move, so confirm the current charge with the clerk before you file. The reason the number looks the same everywhere is that it is the same number. Florida law sets the base charge for opening a formal administration and adds a small statutory service charge on top, so the entire statewide spread across the ten largest counties is one dollar. Our county-by-county filing fee study has all ten posted schedules.

And then there is the number that dwarfs every line above. Florida publishes an attorney fee schedule that is presumed reasonable and scales with the size of the estate, and it is a ceiling the estate may agree to rather than a mandate. On a $100,000 estate the schedule calls $3,000 reasonable. That, not the clerk’s $400, is what probate costs a family. You can run your own numbers in the Florida probate cost calculator.

When the Estate Does Not Need All of This

Before you open a formal administration, rule out the three lighter paths, in this order.

• No probate at all. Only assets in the deceased person’s sole name with no other instruction go through probate. Life insurance and retirement accounts with a named beneficiary, pay-on-death bank accounts, jointly held property with survivorship, property in a funded trust, and a home that passed under a lady bird deed all move without a court case. Sometimes the whole estate turns out to be in that category. Our page on whether you need probate in Florida walks the test.
• Disposition without administration. For the smallest estates, with no real property and not much more than the final bills, whoever paid those bills can ask the clerk to release what is left. It is a request rather than a case, and it costs $231 here. See how disposition without administration works.
• Summary administration. Available when the probate estate is worth $150,000 or less after exempt property, a threshold raised from $75,000 on July 1, 2026, or when the person died more than two years ago. No personal representative is appointed, and the case can close in weeks rather than months. The summary administration guide has a short qualifier.

One warning about that last figure, because it will confuse you if you go looking. Florida publishes its statutes once a year, and the edition on the official statute site still shows the old $75,000 line. The increase to $150,000 is real, it came from a 2026 session law, and the probate rule on summary administration has already been amended to match. Check the rule rather than the posted statute until the new edition appears.

If none of the three fits, the estate needs a formal administration, and the checklist above is the map.

Doing It Yourself, and Where Families Stop

Florida does not require you to hire anyone to file a document. It does require something else, and this is where most families stop. Under the Florida Probate Rules, every personal representative has to be represented by an attorney admitted to practice in Florida unless the representative remains the sole interested person in the estate, or is a Florida-admitted lawyer appearing for himself or herself in that role. Those are the only exceptions. Read it as the practical test it is. One heir, nobody else with an interest, no creditors, and you may proceed alone. A second sibling, or a creditor, and the court expects counsel regardless of how well everyone is getting along.

The smaller paths are different. Disposition without administration is designed to be done without a lawyer, and clerks routinely help with it. Summary administration sits in between, simple on its face and easy to get wrong in ways that surface years later when someone tries to sell the house.

If you do want counsel for a Okaloosa County estate, our probate attorney page for Destin covers what we charge and how the remote process works. And if you would rather do it yourself, nothing on this page is holding anything back. Everything above is the actual sequence.

What Changed at the Okaloosa County Probate Court This Year

Court practice changes without much announcement. These are the developments in the last year that affect a Okaloosa County probate filer, each with its source.

• May 19, 2026. OCAD 2026-04 replaced the county’s e-delivery directive, setting the subject line format for an emergency matter and a same business day disposition. Probate matters are on neither of its enumerated lists. Source.
• February 27, 2026. OCAD 2026-01 restated the division map effective April 1, 2026 and kept probate and guardianship for the whole county with the same judge, vacating ten earlier directives in the process. Source.
• October 29, 2025. OCAD 2025-06 moved every Baker Act and Marchman Act case to a county court division, after an appointment in July 2025 filled the vacancy that had parked those cases with a circuit judge. Source.
• July 1, 2025. AO 2025-27 named the administrative judge for Okaloosa County through June 30, 2027, which matters because the county directives that govern probate are signed by that judge. Source.
• January 28, 2025. The county’s published index of administrative directives carries that revision date and has not been reissued since, so directives numbered 2025-03 and later do not appear on it. Read the directives themselves rather than the index. Source.

Frequently Asked Questions

Common Situations

The inventory that ran past 60 days. A personal representative in Niceville took the letters in March and spent the spring waiting on banks. The county directive gives 60 days from the issuance of the letters for the inventory, and a motion to extend has to be filed before the deadline rather than after it passes. The estate was straightforward and the delay was ordinary. What produced the order to show cause was that nobody asked for more time in writing.

The hearing at the wrong courthouse. A Crestview family drove to the courthouse on James Lee Boulevard for a hearing in their mother’s estate, because Crestview is the county seat and the Clerk’s main office sits there. The Probate Division is at the Courthouse Annex Extension on Lewis Turner Boulevard in Fort Walton Beach, at the south end of the county. The notice of hearing has to state the location, courthouse or Zoom, and that line is the one to read twice.

Sources of Law

Statutes and rules retrieved August 19, 2026. Court, clerk, and filing-fee data retrieved on the dates noted. Local requirements change without much announcement, so confirm the current version at the links above before you file.

• Rules cited are the Florida Probate Rules, current through the opinion issued July 16, 2026, and the Florida Rules of General Practice and Judicial Administration, effective July 1, 2026.
• Filing. Fla. R. Gen. Prac. & Jud. Admin. 2.525(b)(1) (attorneys must file through the portal; no other method permitted except as the rule provides), 2.525(b)(2) (an unrepresented party may elect to file through the portal, and once made the election may not be withdrawn without leave of court), 2.525(c)(1)(A) (a paper document may be submitted to the clerk, who converts it, where filed by an unrepresented party who has not elected). Filings move through the Florida Courts E-Filing Portal, operated by the Florida Courts E-Filing Authority, which states there is no cost to register and no fee to file electronically, apart from the statutory filing fee and a convenience fee based on the payment method.
• The original will. Fla. Stat. §732.901(1) (custodian must deposit within 10 days after receiving information that the testator is dead, with the clerk having venue, supplying the date of death or the last four digits of the social security number), (2) (custodian may be compelled; costs, damages, and a reasonable attorney fee where there was no just or reasonable cause), (3) (an original submitted with a petition is deemed deposited), (4) (clerk preserves the original in original form for at least 20 years; digitizing does not eliminate the requirement). Fla. Prob. R. 5.043 (deposit of wills and codicils; retained in original form).
• Opening the estate. Venue, Fla. Stat. §733.101. Petition, §733.202 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.200 (the eleven required contents). Preference in appointment, §733.301. Nonresident personal representatives, §733.304. Oath before letters, Fla. Prob. R. 5.320 (which also carries the only decedent-estate form written into the rules). Address designation and designation of resident agent with acceptance, both before letters, with the corporate-fiduciary and Florida-Bar-member exceptions, Fla. Prob. R. 5.110. Issuance of letters and bond, Fla. Prob. R. 5.235 and §733.213.
• Notices and claims. Notice of administration served promptly, the persons served, the 3-month objection window for the validity of the will, venue, or jurisdiction, and the estoppel-only extension, Fla. Stat. §733.212 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.240 (exempt property 4 months, elective share 6 months). Notice to creditors published once a week for 2 consecutive weeks, the diligent search for reasonably ascertainable creditors, and notice to the Agency for Health Care Administration within 3 months where the decedent was 55 or older, Fla. Stat. §733.2121 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.241 (proof of publication within 45 days; verified statement of the search within 4 months). Claim deadlines, the later of 3 months from first publication or 30 days from service, §733.702. Two-year bar after death whether or not letters ever issued, §733.710.
• Running and closing. Inventory within 60 days after issuance of letters at date-of-death value, Fla. Stat. §733.604 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.340. Final accounting and petition for discharge within 12 months after issuance of letters for an estate filing no federal estate tax return, Fla. Prob. R. 5.400(c). Attorney required for the personal representative unless the representative remains the sole interested person or is a Florida-admitted attorney appearing in that role, Fla. Prob. R. 5.030(a). Presumed-reasonable attorney compensation, §733.6171.
• Smaller estates. Summary administration, Fla. Stat. §735.201 and Fla. Prob. R. 5.530(a)(7). Reading note. The statute as officially published still shows $75,000, because Florida publishes its statutes annually and the 2026 edition is not yet posted. The $150,000 figure comes from CS/HB 1337 (2026), ch. 2026-57, Laws of Florida, section 7, effective July 1, 2026, and Rule 5.530 has been amended to match. Disposition without administration, §735.301.
• Forms. The Florida Probate Rules place their forms in Part V and state that the forms are not intended to be part of the rules and are provided for convenience only; the Part V set is essentially guardianship forms. The Florida State Courts System’s self-help service states that Florida Courts Help does not provide any forms related to the probate process, in contrast with the Supreme Court-approved family law forms. The practitioner form set commonly used in Florida probate is published and sold by a private nonprofit and is not court-approved.
• Cost. Probate filing service charges, Fla. Stat. §28.2401. Posted Okaloosa County charges read from the clerk’s own schedule, retrieved 2026-08-09; all ten largest counties are documented in our probate cost by county study.
• Caseload. Florida Office of the State Courts Administrator, FY 2024-25 Statistical Reference Guide, Chapter 6, Circuit Probate, tables of filings and dispositions by circuit, county and category, retrieved September 15, 2026.
• Okaloosa County local court layer, retrieved September 16, 2026, from the judicial directory · OCAD 2026-01 · OCAD 2009-06 · OCAD 2025-06 · OCAD 2026-04 · OCAD 2016-04 · OCAD 2017-02. Judge assignments come from the circuit’s assignment orders cited above. The parking and coffee notes are conveniences for visitors, not court information, and the research file with every source is reference/research/probate-court-pilot/okaloosa-county.md.
• Okaloosa County practice, retrieved 2026-08-12: clerk probate page · First Judicial Circuit administrative orders · judges directory · local forms and checklists.

Updated on September 16, 2026. Reviewed by Kevin D. Klagge, Esq., Fla. Bar No. 99502. Attorney Kevin Klagge represents families, businesses, and international clients in estate and tax planning, business structuring, and international law, with a focus on Florida legal tools. He litigates estate and business issues in court. This page is general information about Florida court procedure, not legal advice, and no attorney-client relationship is created by reading it. Court addresses, local checklists, and clerk charges change; confirm them at the official links before you file. We serve Destin residents wherever you are, and this is not a Okaloosa County office.